


Dim and Fuzzy

by PeterParkerPeppers



Category: MCU, Marvel, Spider-Man - Fandom
Genre: Drunk Peter Parker, F/M, Precious Peter Parker, Tony Stark acting as Peter Parker’s parental figure, Trans Peter Parker, Underage Drinking, tony Stark acting as peter parker’s Paternal figure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2019-09-07
Packaged: 2020-10-11 15:47:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20548667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PeterParkerPeppers/pseuds/PeterParkerPeppers
Summary: Peter goes out to a party with MJ and gets a little too drunk. He decides to put his mask on to stare at himself in the mirror and, surprise surprise, Karen alerts Tony with his vitals.





	Dim and Fuzzy

Peter is drunk. Really drunk. He’s staring at himself in the bathroom mirror. Cups and dirt line the sink, and he traces toothpaste rings around the basin. He likes the way alcohol makes his head feel. Dim and fuzzy. His heightened senses sink down and hum quieter in the back of his mind. 

Sure, if he focuses hard enough he can hear the deep thumps of the speaker outside the door and some girl screaming “Jesus Christ, I would pay a million dollars just to sit on the same toilet seat as Noah Centino” and drinks sloshing around cups and and and…

But right now, he’s staring at his face. He likes the way being drunk pulls the corners of his lips up into a smile. Like he’s a puppet being pulled by tiny, tiny strings. His hair is matted with sweat and his dusty brown curls stick messily to his forehead. His cheeks are flushed red. Dimples dot his cheeks and he smiles deeper, contorting his face just to feel his muscles flex and relax. His vision is slightly blurred. Dim and fuzzy. 

A knock shakes Peter out of his head. 

“Dude, I have to fuckin’ piss! Open the goddamn door!” Peter knows it’s not real anger. Just a drunk teen with a full bladder and nothing to lose. He opens the door, offers a “sorry, man”, and makes his way back into the living room. MJ is sitting on a stained red couch in the corner, holding a red cup and swaying with her eyes closed. Fuck, she is beautiful. She’s beautiful and she’s Peter’s. She’d kill him for thinking of her that way. “I’m not property,” she would say. But in his head, she’s his. 

And suddenly he’s in front of her, his autopilot legs plopping him down with a thud into the cushions. He’s giggling, too, and moves his hand up to grab hers, squeezing gently. She opens her eyes and smiles a puppet smile back at him. Her eyes are glossy and her cheeks are flushed. 

“Get me another drink, Parker.”

He’s standing by a cooler now, fishing pink colored juice out into a fresh cup. The liquid is cool and sticky against his fingers. 

“YEET!”

A cup hits the wall next to him and splashes his shoes, but Peter just tips his head back and laughs. 

He and MJ are dancing now. Not grinding like Betty up against Ned, who flashes him a sloppy thumbs up and tilts his hat. He’s got her soft hands in his, and they’re swaying. 

“REAL HOT GIRL SHIT, REAL REAL-”

It hurts Peter’s ears, but the way MJ moves her hips and bumps against him has him pushing them closer to the music. There’s sticky, sweaty people all around them. An arm hits his chest, a leg bumps his, someone steps on his shoe and swipes dirt across the top. Peter doesn’t care. He’s drunk. He’s dancing with his girlfriend. He’s dim and fuzzy.

They’re on the street now. His hand is in MJ’s and her face is lit up under the street lights. She’s beautiful. Her hair is frizzy and sticking out at odd angles, her shirt is crumpled and stained. But she’s laughing and the light is shining off her eyes and she’s beautiful. 

He swings around the streetlight, and pretends to tip a hat at her.

“M’Lady, might I offer you a walk home on this sweet summer night?”

She laughs again. “You’re a dork, Parker. A real dork.”

“Yet, you love me anyway.”

“Yet, I do.”

She kisses him. Soft and slow in the warm yellow light. 

He walks her home, hand aching from absence when she finally pulls away from him. He watches her slowly climb the fire escape to her cracked open window and waits until she pushes it up, lifts a foot effortlessly, and swings her body inside.  
Then he’s home. His head is still swimming. He hears a call for help from a mile or two away and frowns deeply, heart sinking. Dim and fuzzy, dim and fuzzy. He wants another drink. 

He climbs up the walls to his apartment building, shielded by the dark. He’s in his room before he fully registered he was climbing. Being drunk does wonders for the passage of time. 

Now Peter’s staring at himself in the mirror again. Smile, frown, smile, frown. He giggles to himself before laying down on his bed and closing his eyes, letting himself swim in his thoughts. He hears the dim hum of his Iron Spider suit charging in the corner and an idea pops into his head. He wants to see himself in the mirror with the mask on. 

He swings his legs and wobbles over, enjoying the way his head makes his feet stumble. The charger makes his room glow a soft blue. He unplugs it and opens the case, fishing his mask out and sliding it messily over his face. If he’d been sober, he would have thought about the maintenance scan Karen does each time he puts on the suit. But he’s drunk and dim and fuzzy, and he wants to see his mechanical eyes constrict in the mirror. 

An alert from Karen at 2:36 in the morning isn’t unusual to Tony. Especially on a weekend. Still, small bubbles of anxiety pop in his stomach as he unlocks his StarkPhone to check Peter’s vitals.  
“No injuries, oxygen levels stable, no signs of mental distress, and- shit. The kid’s drunk.”

BAC levels are at .14%. Not lethal. If it were anyone else’s vitals, Tony would flip his phone off and get back to working on an update for his thrusters. Maybe shoot them a text asking where his invite went. But it’s not anyone else; it’s Peter.  
And suddenly Tony is angry. He doesn’t even know why. Scratch that, he knows exactly why. The kid is 17 years old, considerably drunk, and wearing a multi-million dollar supersuit. The kid is 17 years old and reminding Tony of himself.

“I swear to fucking God, Parker, if you’re out fighting crime right now I will send a whole flight of Marks out to publicly ground your ass for the next century,” Tony grumbles under his breath.

Peter’s giggling in the mirror and widening his eyes, watching the lenses constrict and grow with a soft whirrrr. Before he knows it, Tony Stark is directly in his line of vision, eyes dark. Peter reacts the only way a drunk teenager confronted with a parental figure would: he screams and throws his mask across the room. 

Peter’s chest heaves up and down and his mind swirls with thoughts without solutions. And then Tony Stark’s face is shining from his phone on the bed. Peter walks over slowly like he’s stalking a wounded animal and picks it up.

Tony would be lying if he said he didn’t let out a laugh when Peter threw him across the room with a yelp. But the anger stayed, simmering deep in his gut, covered only by concern. 

“Hey there, Spiderling.”  
“Hey, hey, hey, Mr. Stark. Hi. How’re- how’re you, uh, doing?”  
“Cut the shit, Parker. I know you’re drunk.”  
Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck.  
“Language.”  
I said that out loud?  
“Sure did.”  
“Are you mad?” Peter’s staring down at his hands and rubbing his thumb harshly into his palm. He’s afraid to look up.  
“Depends. Were you going to go patrolling?”  
“What! No! God, no, Mr. Stark! I could- I could seriously hurt someone, or get hurt. I’d never ever-”  
“Okay, okay. Slow your roll. I figured you wouldn’t.”  
Peter visibly relaxes.  
“So, tell me about your night then.”  
Peter hesitates for a second, but then the words start falling out of his mouth, “So, there was a party at Flash’s-”  
“That snot-nosed shithead?”  
“He’s cool now, Mr. Stark, I promise. Anyway, MJ told me to come with her and so I had to come and I don’t usually drink too much when I go to parties but they had a beer bong and I wanted to try it and then one of the football players wanted to see if I could outlast his keg stand and so-”  
“I don’t need that many details, kiddo.”  
“Right, right, sorry. But anyway, I went to the bathroom and I just realized that I liked the way being drunk made my face look in the mirror, you know? I usually have all these thoughts and senses and my mind is always running and it was just nice to feel, uh, dim and fuzzy for a little while,”  
Tony’s mouth flattens into a thin line, and his eyes crinkle with a heavy sadness.  
“So, I decided to drink some more and then, uh, yeah. Here I am. I didn’t know Karen would alert you, I promise. I’m really sorry to bother you, Sir.”  
“You never bother me, kid. I’m glad you had fun, but I’m gonna need you to elaborate on the whole racing thoughts thing.”  
“I’m not crazy, Mr. Stark. I just, ya know, have a hard time shuttin’ my brain off sometimes. And with the senses. It just- I can always hear people calling for help. Calling for anyone. Calling for me.  
“And I just- I can’t help everyone all the time and I know that, but when I’m just laying around with friends or, like, taking a shit, I just… I don’t know, I feel like I could be doing more.”  
Tony takes a deep breath and looks Peter over. The kid’s eyes are glossy, and he’s staring down at his hands again.  
“It’s natural to feel that way. When I first got back from Afghanistan, all I could do was make suits. I couldn’t even stay caught up on Breaking Bad, and you know I love that show. I thought that if I was doing anything, thinking anything, that wasn’t put towards keeping me and those around me safe, that it wasn’t worth doing at all. But you know what?”  
“What?”  
“All it did was drive me nuts. It pushed Rhodey away. Pepper away. Everyone I was trying to keep safe- all I did was hurt them.”  
“So, what did you do?”  
“I blew all of my suits up in a beautiful firework display for Pepper.”  
Peter giggles. “Then what?”  
“I got therapy.”  
“Oh.”  
“Yeah,” Tony’s eyes shine with recognition, “oh.”  
“Is it easier now?” There’s a shine in Peter’s eyes again.  
“More or less. Some days are great. Some days I can actually sleep, and I wake up late with Pepper in my arms and we spend all day watching Grey’s Anatomy or God knows whatever else Pepper’s been bingeing lately.”  
“Hey, you know you love Grey’s!”  
“Beside the point. I spent a lot of my life building, hiding, drinking,” Peter cringes at that, “but at the end of the day, the only thing that will actually make you feel better, feel safe, is yourself. You just have to do the work.  
“Now, I’m not saying you need to stop drinking- don’t tell May that, by the way. You’re a teenager. You need to have fun, relax, and experience. But don’t use it as a mask. The dim and fuzzy is nice kid, but it’s not a state to live in.”  
“I know,” Peter pauses a moment, “are you- are you really not mad at me?”  
“I’m mad, kiddo,” Peter sucks in a breath, “but not at you. That’s my own shit to deal with. Too much self-reflecting or whatever. But I’m not mad at you, no. You walked MJ home, you were safe, you didn’t drink yourself into a coma or go out in the suit. From now on, you should probably avoid putting the mask on when you’re like this, though. Late night Karen alerts aren’t good for an old man’s heart.”  
Peter tilts his head back and laughs, loudly at first and then softer when he remembers May is still sleeping.  
“So, you’re admitting you’re old.”  
“Shut it, you, before I call May.”  
Peter knows he’s joking but shuts up for a second anyway.  
“Thanks, Mr. Stark.”  
“For what?”  
“I don’t know, for checking up on me.”  
“Always, kiddo. Now get some sleep. And don’t think we won’t be having another, more sober conversation about this tomorrow.”  
“Sir, yes, sir. Goodnight, Mr. Stark.”  
“Goodnight, kid.”


End file.
